


Moments of Quietness

by qmzr



Series: short re:zero oneshots [2]
Category: Re:ゼロから始める異世界生活 | Re:Zero Starting Life in Another World (Anime)
Genre: Not super Graphic, One Shot, but i'll do it anyway, it would be kind of funny to tag an rbd death as major character death, subaru usually dies too fast to start wanting to die so i gave him some time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:33:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29848503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qmzr/pseuds/qmzr
Summary: Subaru lay broken in a ravine littered with bodies, thinking to himself.
Series: short re:zero oneshots [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2190291
Comments: 8
Kudos: 65





	Moments of Quietness

**Author's Note:**

> a small entry in the unthinkable presents contest, hope yall like it

The searing pain of bone deep injuries were nothing new to Natsuki Subaru. There was a reason why he liked to call himself a meat shield extraordinaire, after all, but this particular incident jarred his flesh and bone before his mind could process what just occurred.

Sharp, shallow breaths punctuated the air as a few errant pebbles peppered him, remnants of the ledge that had slid clean off the cliffside. 

There was a stinging pain in his lungs and he would bet his life savings that at least a rib had broken. He probably cracked a tooth too. Did it come from the fall or from clenching his jaw too hard? Regardless, it was more work for Beako or Emilia when they’d eventually find him.

They were damn good healers, even Emilia without the aid of that damn cat. Wait, he’d forgotten to include Garfiel too. The kid would be pissed off for being brushed off like that, and Subaru half-jokingly cursed his poor memory.

They’ll come eventually. He’ll get patched up when they find him, and hopefully most of the people down here too. Some of them must be alive, though Subaru dearly wished they were at least unconscious.

He squinted at the glaring midday sun and closed his eyes to cut off another source of discomfort. If one person has to remain awake to call for help when others arrive, he’d prefer it to be him. He told himself that not only out of worry for everyone else, but through a need to occupy his mind until rescue or else the pain would whittle away at his sanity even more. 

Gritting his teeth, he concentrated on the sounds around him to distract himself. Loudest were the chirping of birds. Then, it was the rustling of nearby trees. Water dripped down the cliff and splashed into shallow puddles. Did it rain recently?

Occasionally, he’d feel a rock shift underneath him, and sometimes a pained groan was uttered nearby, but he couldn’t turn to check on whoever it was since it felt as if his upper half wouldn’t listen to what its brain told it to do. Subaru hoped those noises were just made reflexively. There must’ve been a few dozen people on that cliff with him, but with his head directly angled at the sky and his neck immobile, he couldn’t see any of their faces down here even if he forced his eyes to nearly roll.

Something shifted in the corner of his vision, and his attention snapped onto it.

It was likely an unusually thick sapling in the breeze. If he’d fallen just a bit more to the left, he would’ve gotten skewered by the thing. See? Even he could get lucky sometimes, he laughed to himself.

…

… 

… He detested this.

Even in the worst of times he at least had the agency to squirm, and not being able to twitch a finger filled him with a hazy, directionless resentment that could be targeted at nobody but fate itself. 

There was nothing to do but wait, and wait he did, whether he wanted to or not.

At least a half hour passed and the sun had barely shifted. Subaru didn’t know. He shut his eyes once more to block out the sunlight burning at his retina.

Once, he stared directly at the sun for ten seconds on a dare and immediately regretted it. He wasn’t eager to repeat that mistake, though it was honestly really funny considering how stupid that was, and only got a cheap candy bar for all his trouble.

Besides reminiscing there was nothing to do but listen. After a bit longer behind closed eyelids, he had noticed something that gave him a few more sparks of hope.

A soft breath, barely audible, could be heard about a foot away from his head. Not surprising, but if he focused even harder, he could hear at least seven more people breathing with varying degrees of raspiness. All of them were surprisingly close, and Subaru was stunned and disappointed that he didn’t notice them earlier.

They’d have a long wait for relief. He felt a pang of regret at not being able to escape somehow. Due to his inability to react in time, he got swept up in this mess without being able to run off and seek help, but maybe if he grabbed his whip faster, or held onto that branch a bit harder-

No, it was too late for that sort of thing. What’s done is done.

But even so, there must have been something he could have tried, so at least everyone’s suffering could be-

Stop. Dwelling on past regrets did nothing for no one. Think of something more positive, like how Beatrice could use their link to pinpoint this location. She’d find everyone without a problem.

But did she know there was trouble in the first place? 

Subaru’s heart sank further before registering that she’d likely grow worried in a few hours, and, come nightfall, become suspicious and take action alongside some other camp members. The realization granted a modicum of relief. Now, he had a solid thread to cling to instead of a vague belief.

In his stress-induced exhaustion and blood loss, he succumbed to fatigue and sunk into a blissfully thoughtless sleep.

* * *

A quiet _“-hk!”_ was the only sign of a living creature in the ravine.

A sudden muscle spasm had unpleasantly jerked Subaru into consciousness once more, much to his displeasure. It was good to know that he hadn’t just died, but if he was going to live anyway, it would be better if he could get fixed up before he opened his eyes.

Mind muddled and vision foggy, he noted that the sun was still out. A few hours had probably passed.

Soon. They’d come soon, but it was getting harder to breathe than before. He needed to breathe to live, he reminded himself dumbly, and continued to overwork his abused lungs.

Having concentrated more on his labored breaths, it took a moment before he realized that sapling seemed to have shifted close enough to register as a blob of color instead of an occasional motion. The thing was oddly pale, he noted absently.

The environment around hadn’t really changed aside from that, but there was one last thing to check for. 

He pricked his ears up again. The breathing closest to him had stopped. 

His blood ran colder as he noticed fewer sounds of life. No gasping, sputtering or wheezing breaths. Of course, that didn’t necessarily mean they were dead, but those who disappeared off his radar rested in a horribly grey zone of doubt; their prospects of survival rapidly diminished with each passing minute, and his along with it as well.

The passage of time barreled onward at a painful crawl, and soon, the sun was on the verge of setting. 

Subaru was finding it harder to focus his vision, and he grew frustrated trying to form a solid view of the sky, as worthless a task as it seemed.

It didn’t help that the ground somehow felt harder than before. Ignoring a few odd bumps, it was originally softer than most grass he liked to lay on, but now it was almost as if the earth had come alive to jab at his already weakened body.

The sun sank below the horizon. It was completely silent aside from the chirps of nearby insects. Everyone had gone quiet.

He forced himself not to think of the worst. If he managed to survive so long after the fall, then there was a good chance that some others had too. Hope. That was what he called it, but it was mostly just desperation. It might be bad to lie to others, but a white lie all to himself had no harm. 

He really wished Beatrice would speed up. He didn’t want to die.

Dying wasn’t something like the prick from a flu shot. He couldn’t get used to it no matter how many times it happened. Only a wholly nihilistic person, one that has truly cast aside their life, could rid themself of the visceral dread that sinks into their entire being in the moment of death, even while remaining completely aware. That was the sort of person Subaru feared the most if they held power, and pitied to death if they didn’t. 

The sapling had come even closer somehow, and his moving earth theory was starting to look more appealing than ever. Strangely, the branches on top were curled in on itself. It was as pale as snow, though it felt sickly to witness, for some odd reason.

The large sapling looked awfully familiar, almost like… a hand.

A thin hand, like that of a child’s, hovered close, lightly clenched and unmoving with the palm facing him. Mentally, he traced the forearm to the upper arm. And from that to the shoulder to the rest of their body, undoubtedly located underneath his own.

A nauseatingly rank odor had been building up over the past hour. It was one that Subaru could almost taste at the back of his throat.

The pain wracking his nerves was immediately blown out of mind when he realized, and a ripple of adrenaline and panic coursed through him. However, the energy had nowhere to go. He couldn’t get up and was left to trace the contour of the child’s torso, pressed against his own, over and over without ever seeing their face. 

When he concentrated harder against his will, the child’s other hand led to another larger lump. That was when he began to notice them. 

All of a sudden, that stick digging into his neck was a finger, the bump underneath his foot was a skull. A rock prodding his side was an elbow, and the soft earth beneath his head was a stomach. 

The sheer thought of resting on a corpse made him dry heave as much as he physically could, and he felt grateful that they at least didn’t squirm. Such a callous thought shook him to the core and he mentally beat himself into a pulp for the passing thought.

Cushioning his body was the flesh of those he wished to save. 

The sounds of ragged breathing steadily growing fainter were his fault. Were they the reason why he didn’t die sooner? The last thing the dying needed was to be crushed under the weight of another human. 

Why did it take so long for him to realize? Was he really that foolish? No, it was more like he didn’t even process the possibility of it. Puzzling out the situation was the worst thing he could have done in this time of sheer helplessness, and subliminally, he recognized that and his unconscious reacted in turn. But was he truly out of options?

The warmth of direct sunlight had left quite a while ago, and the sins breathing on his neck might have died, but he could feel the ghost of them tickling his skin. He recognized the scent of death now. 

The ones at the bottom of the pile were definitely gone by this point. He could feel it.

Even if he were to live, he would undoubtedly take on permanent damage, rendering his position in the Emilia camp to nothing but emotional support. All his training would become useless, and in a world that treated Subaru with unfeeling cruelty, that would be an endlessly fatal position.

Ever since that last insane Tea Party, he promised to live each life as if it were his last, and for the most part, it was a simple matter. Gut reflex was all it took.

It’s long, drawn out times like these that he hated so much. He didn’t want time to think this over. Most of his prior deaths were sudden or occurred in a clouded state of mind, so he rarely had moments where he could calmly sit down after a bad loop and wish for death.

He remembered when the Sanctuary cathedral burned with everyone inside. The dread from realizing that they chose that over the Great Rabbit settled neatly alongside every other regret in that hellish loop. He understood, he understood and yet wanted them to try harder even if it would’ve only made it more painful for nothing, while prolonging his own suffering in some sick act of self punishment or he wouldn’t be able to let himself die in a poor facsimile of repentance.

Now he was considering death again? He was the worst. Satella wouldn’t get mad at him though, but any amount of heartbroken disappointment felt leagues worse than anger ever could.

Emilia would cry in a grief-filled rage if she knew, telling him to value himself more. He did. He really did care about himself more, but there were still bigger things than his own life that he could never hope to match, and a cluster of living people whose lives he could potentially save practically threw him off the weighing scale.

This torn up selfishness was virtually unavoidable in this situation. If he wished for death, he’d spit on everything he’d promised Satella that day. If he vied for life, then that would mean leaving everyone here for dead. 

His selfishness would end up hurting someone no matter what he chose.

Static was beginning to fill his ears. 

No decision on what to think was made, and he was almost grateful that his ability to pick slipped through his fingers. 

In the end, they found him lying there with glassy, distant eyes. None of their words filtered through to him.

Emilia clutched at his hands, but he didn’t feel it.

Otto dropped to his knees, but he didn’t see it.

Beatrice sobbed beside him, but he didn’t hear it.

Someone poked his shoulder and he stiffened at the contact, his mind snapping back enough to process the situation. He turned back dazedly to face her after the buzzing cleared from his mind.

“Hey, are you alright, Subaru? Do you need to lie down?” she asked, eyebrows scrunched cutely. “You just stopped walking all of a sudden like your brain flew away.”

Wordlessly, he took in her concerned face and surveyed his surroundings. A few people were sitting down for tea in the corner. Garfiel was visible from the window, shaking a tree for some reason, and Frederica was staring at her brother with a chastising tut, shaking her head.

“Ah,” he replied after a moment, tone unnaturally flat. “I don’t feel like lying down right now. I’ve done enough of that for now.”


End file.
